“Yeah,” I say, already closing the door.
I wait until I hear the telltale ding of the hotel elevator, then I curl up on Jacob’s side of the bed, hug his favorite hoodie into my chest, and cry like I’m a fucking toddler.
6
Fireside
After that first night, in Jacob’s hotel, I wasn’t sure I’d ever hear from him again. His alarm had gone off at five a.m., and he’d groaned and reached over me to turn it off, cursing strong liquor and early flights.
“I bet they never make you fancy F1 drivers take the red-eye,” he grumbled.
“Isn’t a red-eye an overnight flight?” I asked groggily, still half asleep.
“You might be right,” he said. Then, without warning, he crawled over me and kissed me hard. “So clever,” he murmured against my lips. His hands were sliding around my neck, his weight settling against me, and suddenly I wasn’t tired at all anymore. He chuckled as my hands moved down his back.
“No time, Keeping,” he said. “No time.”
He hopped off me, laughing at whatever he saw in my face, and then disappeared into the shower. I sat up, feeling turned on but also awkward. I’d never been in a situation like this before, and I wasn’t sure what the etiquette was. Was he expecting me to leave while he showered? Or was he expecting me to follow him in?
While this idea worked its way through my body, the shower turned off and Jacob reemerged with wet hair and skin and a towel wrapped around his waist. He rummaged through his suitcase, pulling out a T-shirt and jeans and cursing as he stubbed his toe on the bed.
My eyes caught on the hotel room coffee machine. I bit my lip. “Do you want me to make you a coffee?”
He blinked at me, like he was surprised, and then grinned. “Definitely.”
It felt much better to have something to do, so I busied myself making him coffee while he dressed and packed. When that was done, I made the bed—just because it always stressed me out, leaving a bed unmade. When I finished, Jacob was watching me.
“You know a housekeeper is just going to strip that,” he commented.
I flushed. “I know.”
Two seconds later, he was in my arms again, kissing me so hard my lips felt bruised when he pulled away. “You are such a fucking weirdo,” he said, and pushed me backward onto the bed.
“I thought you said there wasn’t time,” I said on a dry throat.
“No time for you to fuck me again, no,” he said. “Maybe just enough time for me to suck you off.”
He pulled my boxers off as he said it, and before my brain could process his words, his mouth was on me. A strangled noise slipped out of my lips. He’d touched me last night, and let me fuck him, but he hadn’t used his mouth. It was all tight, wet heat and pressure, and when I hit the back of his throat, my whole body pulsed, and a strangled noise slipped from my lips. He withdrew with a chuckle.
“You are too easy,” he said, his voice dry and slightly smug.
I rose up on my elbows, my blood throbbing hard at the sight of him kneeling fully clothed on the floor, his hands on my thighsand his mouth just above me. He seemed to be waiting for some sort of response to his words, but all I could manage was “Yeah.”
His grin widened, then he leaned forward and took me in his mouth again, a steady, rhythmic slide. I dug my fingers into the bedsheets, resisting the urge to grip his hair. My whole body felt like it was on fire. It was taking every ounce of strength I had not to move my hips, but after a few moments, he pulled back again abruptly.
“Well, go on, then,” he said, looking up at me with those blown-out pupils and that crooked, confident smile.
It was a challenge, and not one I was sure I was equal to. But I’d be damned if I could’ve done anything but thread my fingers into his hair and thrust into his mouth, trying to be as gentle as I could. He moaned around me and that was all it took.
“Fuck,” was all I was capable of saying when it was over. “Fuck.”
He grinned again, watching me. I was about to offer to reciprocate—I’d never done it before, but the mechanics didn’t seem overly complicated—but before I could speak, he was on his feet saying, “Christ, now I’mreallygoing to be late.”
He brushed his teeth and finished throwing clothes in his suitcase while I tried to remember how to breathe again. As he pulled his baseball cap on, I heard myself say, “Will I see you again?”
I sounded pathetic, and I knew it. Jacob laughed. “?’Course you will. We both have a race in September. That’s, what, four weeks away?”
My disappointment must’ve shown on my face, because he cackled. “You’re too much fun. Tell you what—I’m going to this cabin in Harris next week with some friends. I might be persuaded to stay a few days extra if you happened to show up after they left.”
